1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to data verification. More particularly, the present invention is directed to verifying the accuracy of charges on customer bills before the customer bills are sent to the respective customers.
2. Background of the Invention
Large utility companies such a regional telephone companies must generate and mail thousands, and typically millions, of customer bills each month. Typically, bills are generated in batches on a mainframe computer that stores customer and account information. For each batch or billing cycle, the mainframe computer collects the relevant charges for each customer, calculates appropriate taxes, tariffs and/or other charges, and organizes these several elements into a format that can be printed and understood by a customer.
Telecommunications service billing, and particularly telephone service billing, is especially complicated. Using a residential telephone customer as an example, one of the only charges on the bill that remains relatively constant from month to month, or even from customer to customer, is a monthly service charge that all residential customers must pay. However, there are a host of additional charges that are included in a typical telephone bill including premium services such as call waiting and call forwarding services, emergency 911 charges, late payment charges, long distance (toll) charges and bulk item charges such as directory assistance. Furthermore, telephone companies typically serve customers in several jurisdictions including cities, counties, and states, each having its own unique taxing, tariff and/or surcharge paradigm that may be applied in unique ways to the several services charged to a customer's account.
In view of the complexity of the several taxes, tariffs and surcharges that may be applicable to a customer's account, it is not uncommon for errors to appear on customer bills. Accordingly, large enterprises, such as telephone companies, often establish a department that is charged with reviewing the accuracy of customer bills before the bills are sent (e.g., mailed) to customers. This review process amounts to a “sanity check” on the output of the mainframe computer that is running complex computer algorithms that calculate and, presumably, properly apply the appropriate taxing and charging schemes to the individual customer accounts. Thus, bill verification typically involves obtaining a sample of all or a batch of bills, and preferably at least a sample from each major jurisdiction, e.g., a state, reviewing those bills, and verifying them for elements such as taxes and fractionalization of other charges and credits (OC&Cs).
The bill verification function is particularly important where the mainframe computing function is performed by an outside contractor or consultant, i.e., the function is outsourced. In such a situation there is significantly less oversight of the overall billing process, thereby leading, potentially, to increased billing errors and thus increased customer dissatisfaction and complaints. There may also be legal ramifications if customer bills are grossly erroneous.
The conventional method of conducting bill verification is to manually review each sample or “hold” bill, manually identify each of the charges on the bill that is subject to taxation, for example, manually calculate the taxes for each charge by using tax tables, manually calculate a sum for the charges and compare that sum to the data on the “hold” bill. These manual procedures, however, are extremely slow, tedious and prone to errors.